baghdad

Two people, one city, different times; connected by a memoir. Can love exist in a city destined for decades of misery?

In the 10th century, Baghdad instituted a licensing exam that all doctors had to take before practicing as physicians

You asked if I loved her? I can't even whisper her name, my heart would burst out of my chest.

An hour later. the moon reflected its light on the Tigris as well. The sun, the moon, and Fatima. What else could I ask for?

I know a feeling like that only comes once in a lifetime, and I think you should follow your heart__ desires. I believe in love, and I know love conquers all.

You might think that the Left could have a regime-change perspective of its own, based on solidarity with its comrades abroad. After all, Saddam's ruling Ba'ath Party consolidated its power by first destroying the Iraqi communist and labor movements, and then turning on the Kurds (whose cause, historically, has been one of the main priorities of the Left in the Middle East). When I first became a socialist, the imperative of international solidarity was the essential if not the defining thing, whether the cause was popular or risky or not. I haven't seen an anti-war meeting all this year at which you could even guess at the existence of the Iraqi and Kurdish opposition to Saddam, an opposition that was fighting for 'regime change' when both Republicans and Democrats were fawning over Baghdad as a profitable client and geopolitical ally. Not only does the 'peace' movement ignore the anti-Saddam civilian opposition, it sends missions to console the Ba'athists in their isolation, and speaks of the invader of Kuwait and Iran and the butcher of Kurdistan as if he were the victim and George W. Bush the aggressor.

There is a little bit of everybody in everybody.

Gentlemen. You are looking at the true Abraham Lincoln of Arabia. And in order to end our internal bickering - our civil war, if you will - I have solicited your aid.

Next time -- we will roll out the red carpet for you in the United States of Arabia, my brethren!

The Americans were understandably on hair triggers. There was a good reason for all of this security. For despite TV images of quick victory, much of Baghdad certainly had not fallen and firefights with die-hard Ba__thists loyal to Saddam Hussein were raging all over the city.

Muslim and non-Muslim from across the world flocked to Baghdad to be part of Al-Ma'mun's project "Bait Al-Hekmah" or "House of Wisdom